CONSUMPTION OF MALT OF HOME MADE SPIRITS. 345 



" England is therefore taxed out of all proportion 

 to the other parts of the United Kingdom ; but the in- 

 equality does not rest here, for the poorest counties in 

 England, that is, those having the worst or most 

 sandy soil, have to bear the greatest part of the 

 burden, barley being principally grown on those 

 sandy soils, which require considerable outlay. Now 

 allowing the consumption of malt in the United King- 

 dom to be 33,000,000 bushels, and giving ten bushels 

 to every hogshead of beer, the quantity of beer which 

 each individual would have, would be little more than 

 one pint per week ! Were the tax taken off malt, we 

 might safely calculate on the consumption rising to 

 seven pints a week, which consuming 231,000,000 

 bushels of malt annually, would set afloat in one 

 ingredient of the beer alone a captial of 39,600,000 

 annually, at the rate of 4ts. a bushel for the extra 

 amount of malt consumed, independent of its effects 

 on the health of the people, in weaning them from 

 the use of ardent spirits, contracted in consequence of 

 their beer being so bad and so dear. Indeed it is no 

 exaggeration (as it could be proved by the writer in 

 detail) to say that the total abolition of the tax on 

 malt, would give circulation to a capital of full fifty 

 millions sterling per annum ! But the moral effects 

 resulting from the repeal now advocated, would be 

 incalculably far greater than the pecuniary. 



" The quantity of home-made spirits consumed in 

 the United Kingdom (independent of illicit distillation) 

 is, for England 8,000,000 gallons ; Ireland 9,000,000 ; 

 Scotland, 6,000,000; total 23,000,000, of gallons. The 

 money laid out by the people in gin and whiskey 

 Q 5 



